Observation on the Cardinal: Razor sharp at the feet and up vertically. Soft at the eye and general head area. Do you have more than one focus point active? Possibly the Cardinal moved its head to at the exposure. If you are doing NR then some of the area under the beak and top behind the eye looks like it was softened due to processing?
Colors are splendid, what is sharp...............is sharp!

Dragons..............killer cool and sharp! Digging that eye on the second dragon also a nice comp on this one

Very nice set, Birdie. The last one has the most impact of the three images. Sharp and with a great separation from the bg.
In the first one looks like you got some soft focus in the eye. Get the habit to aim the focus point on the subject eye. The eyes are the most critical thing in a subject and as long as they are in focus it doesn't matter if the rest of the image is soft
Socrate

Awesome set Birdie. Dragon has different meaning to me, love Night Fury, hope you can catch one in flight for me . #3 is my top pick, would be even better if you have more space on the left and less on the right, IMHO.

Lovely dragon images, Birdie. Love the last one.
I think with the pose of the cardinal it's really hard to get much more in focus even stopped down.
I agree with Socrate to focus on the eye/head and it will look amazing even with other soft parts.
Chris